


Forces both apposing and attracting

by Pip (orphan_account)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Boarding School, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Coming of Age, M/M, Masturbation, Mild Sexual Content, Sexuality, Teenagers, Virginity, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-08
Updated: 2014-07-08
Packaged: 2018-02-08 01:36:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1921794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Pip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'The friendship of Nara Shikamaru and Hyūga Neji was not one anyone around them would have anticipated. On the surface, the two seemed completely alternate forces.'</p><p>Hyūga Neji, genius prodigy of the successful Hyūga international business group, ideal life set before him, has a problem. He does not wish to face it, yet cannot ignore it. It's name is Nara Shikamaru and his catalyst is the Konoha Academy boarding school.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of a larger AU I have been mentally tossing about for a while now. As well as this plot-line centred around our favourite young geniuses (which I plan to finish two, or possible three, three-to-four chapter short pieces in) I have some other mental sketches for other characters that may materialise.  
> The AU is a little more complex than 'near-modern day teenagers in a boarding school' but that's what you'll be getting a taste of here for now.  
> Regardless, thank you for reading! Please flag up any errors you find that I may have missed in my editing and let me know what you think of the work so far.  
> -Pip

The friendship of Nara Shikamaru and Hyūga Neji was not one anyone around them would have anticipated. On the surface, the two seemed completely alternate forces. The Nara's laziness and lack of focus seemed to be at odds with the Hyūga prodigy's driven disposition. Perhaps 'friendship' wasn't quite the term. They had an uneasy alliance? A mutual vague acceptance? A silent truce...?

Something. They had something.

At the start of Shikamaru's first year of senior high school some odd numbers and logistical issues in the males in his year left some of them roomed on the predominantly second year floor.

Second and third years tended to get the smaller dorm rooms, sleeping only two or three. Given that Shikamaru and Neji seemed the, comparatively, least likely to kill each other over the course of the year, they were assigned to share a room. At times Neji seemed to despise the Nara for his disinterest in, seemingly, all things. To see his intellectual equal, possibly even his better, allowing himself to be thought a fool, to witness what he felt was an abominable waste, was maddening. And what was worse was that Shikamaru even showed indifference to Neji's ire.

Neji gave up on trying to get the Nara to keep his belongs tidy by the end of the second week of term. When the state of disarray of one half of the room truly became too much to bear, the Hyūga began neatening it himself, insisting he couldn't focus on his own studies in such conditions. Shikamaru didn't complain, but surprisingly tried to keep his things a little more organised in the following months.

The one extra permanent fixture in the sparse room was a wooden shogi board in the centre of the floor. It was not uncommon for the pieces to be left in formation, frozen in a paused game, during the week. During their shogi matches was the one time in which Shikamaru showed absolute focus.

The Nara almost always won, but he worked for it, and Neji revelled in the tactical challenge, and the change in Shikamaru's demeanour.

* * *

The click of wooden pieces was the rhythm of their small room, syncopated and irregular and yet calming in its way. For an hour or two the stacks of papers and assignments lay forgotten on both their desks, crammed into each corner of the square room with just enough space left that one could walk three paces between the two beds that occupied the rest of the room: just enough space for the shogi board if they both sat on the floor with their backs against their bed-frames.

A slight twitch of aggravation at his eye was Neji's only show of emotion as Shikamaru claimed his second silver general. He knew the game was already lost. Shikamaru placed his fingertips together, hands falling into that common arch of consideration.

But what exactly was he considering? He'd all but won the game. One move from check and he'd stopped to contemplate?

"Did Tenten ask you out yet?" The Nara said in his monotone drawl, sounding like he was asking about a maths assignment.

"Did-?" Neji's head snapped up. "How does that have any relevance whatsoever?"

"It's got none at all." Shikamaru looked up from the board. "Just curious...trying to get all my pieces together."

"What the hell is that meant to mean?" Neji replied sharply.

"I don't know." The younger male smirked just a little. "But I'm thinking your defensiveness definitely means something."

"Piss off Nara."

"Wow, the mighty Hyūga stoops to swearing." Shikamaru said in mock shock and awe. "I must have really hit a nerve."

"Drop it." Neji stood up, fully intent of leaving if this conversation wasn't ended.

"It's ten to eleven, Hyūga," Shikamaru leaned back over the board casually to execute his winning move. "I'd be careful if you plan to storm out after hours. Sneaking around at night tends to give someone a bad record."

The smile the Nara shot up at him was challenging, almost playful. The harshness in Neji's returning glare showed the humour had crossed a line this time.

Shikamaru cursed internally as the Hyūga left. Damn, Hyūga Neji didn't have lines, he had a maze of tripwires, linked to unexploded devices. His head had clearly been hardwired to the defensive. As for what he was defended, Shikamaru found his thoughts turning to an aggressive, fatalistic and pointedly silent child he'd known a few years ago.

There was no denying someone fucked Neji up a little. Now why the hell did Shikamaru always manage to involve himself?

He ran a hand through his spiky hair, fixing his messy ponytail. How the hell was he meant to avoid booby-traps he couldn't even begin to sketch a map of? Every other conversation with his roommate had been managing to end in an argument for several weeks now. Clearly the lazy genius was missing something.

* * *

Neji was sitting out on the small area of roof space accessible for maintenance above the dormitory block. He was cold and tired but he'd be damned if he was going to admit his tactical error and crawl back to the room a below and his warm bed. He cursed himself for being such a child.

Not just a child, a coward too. What the hell was he doing, taking every opportunity to start an argument and by extension create openings to avoid Shikamaru?

_And for what? Because I want-?_

No. No, no, no. That was not what he was thinking. That was not the problem. Damn it he didn't-

No. Just no.

He'd been unable to deal with the Nara since a night three weeks ago. He supposed that the situation had merely been one of those hazards of boarding school, with an abundance of teenage hormones and gendered dormitory blocks. It wasn't even as if it was Shikamaru's fault; he hardly had control over his dreams.

Neji, very much a light sleeper, had been woken by his roommate tossing in his sleep. Shikamaru had groaned into his pillow, placing his sleeping thoughts squarely where one least wishes them while sharing a room. Neji had ignored it for a time until the flop of crumpled covers onto the wooden floor as the Nara moved had turned his head.

The curtains were drawn open, letting in just enough light to pick up a little of the detail of Shikamaru's still sleeping outline in the opposite bed: now on his back, arching up at emptiness only he knew the ethereal occupant of; sweating, straining, groaning softly into the silence.

Neji rubbed at his closed eyelids, wishing to banish the image, banish the memory. He couldn't. And therein lay his issue.


	2. Chapter 2

"Ok Hyūga, this is getting more troublesome than I can be bothered to deal with, so tell me what I fucked up so we can go back to quietly tolerating each other."

It took Shikamaru three more days to finally question Neji's actions. He cornered the older male in the hallway outside a science room, waiting until the area was relatively empty.

"I have no idea what you're talking about Nara." Neji responded, calm and level as ever. 

_No land-mines so far..._

"Don't play the idiot. It doesn't suit you." Shikamaru said, tone clipped and annoyed already. "You've been intentionally pissing me off or just outright avoiding me for days now. I did something. Just tell me what, because I can't for the life of me reason out how in the hell I got to you anymore than usual."

"It's none of your concern, Nara." Neji said, still calm but becoming sterner. "Drop it."

"It can't be me bugging you about Tenten because you were already acting like this then, so what is it?" Shikamaru pushed, clearly aggregated.

"Stop it Nara. This isn't something for you to puzzle out," Neji replied, hoping to create an opening for his exit. "Nor is this the time for you to finally discover enough effort to care about pursing anything."

"Oh for fuck's sake Hyūga!" Shikamaru brought his hand to temple. "Yeah, I'm a lazy arse. We both know that and I've got no problems with it. But do you genuinely think I'm enough of an arsehole to let this lie when I've clearly done something majorly wrong here? Is that really how little you think of me? How little you think I actually give a damn?"

"Since when did you give a damn at all?" Neji replied, pointed but cold.

"Believe it or not I'm a pretty average human being, you know? I am inclined to give a few shits about my friends." Shikamaru wasn't really that angry at Neji; he was angry he'd made some major tactical error in the scape of their odd friendship.

Neji turned away, choosing a swift departure. He was halfway to the stairwell before Shikamaru followed after him.

"No you don't Hyūga. Stop running away from me and tell what's happening." The Nara pushed through the door to the silent stairwell, abandoned now as the school populace headed to lunch either outside or on the other side of the building.

"Stop, Nara." Neji turned to face him now, looking almost pained.

"Just don't...don't push this."

"Push **what** , Hyūga?!" Shikamaru exclaimed, exasperated.

Neji didn't respond. He started walking down the stairs in silence.

"Hyūga, for fuck's sake! What is it?"

No reply came; Shikamaru followed down the flight of stairs.

"What the hell?! Seriously, talk to me! How did I fuck this up?! What did I do? **Neji**!"

The Hyūga turned, not wanting to consider if that was pain as well as frustration in Shikamaru's voice, not wanting to hear anything...not wanting to feel anything.

"You didn't do anything." Neji said, voice low, almost as if defeated.

"Don't lie. You've clearly been trying to distance yourself from me. I obviously did something wrong." Shikamaru replied.

Neji took one step closer to him, pale eyes oddly intense. His mind was tearing itself apart with blame and anger and confusion and a hundred other forces he could barely give form to.

"No. The wrong is all on my part." Neji said distantly, as if he'd not intended to voice the thought at all.

The Hyūga's gaze was tracing Shikamaru's features, picking out every detail of the expression of confusion and concern that played out there. He didn't notice that Shikamaru took a step forwards, closing all but a minimal distance between them.

"What ' _wrong_ '?" Shikamaru asked, all frustration faded from his voice, leaving it bare and raw.

It was the look in the Nara's doe brown eyes that snapped something behind Neji's. He leaned forward and pressed his lips against Shikamaru's briefly before pulling back twice as swiftly.

Seconds later the Nara blinked in absolute confusion, wondering if he'd just blacked out and imagined that. It seemed utterly impossible and nonsensical. As did the rising pleasurable warmth in his chest at the sustained closeness of the other male.

As Neji tried to back away Shikamaru's responded to the inexplicable instinct to keep him where he was, grabbing hold of his shoulder and slamming their lips back together. The warmth extended between them, foreign but quickly becoming welcome. The Nara ran his tongue over the other's lips until they parted. Their tongues met experimentally, just a little awkwardly.

When they eventually parted neither said a word. Silence extended out, filling the space around them as they stared at each other, impassive and internally shocked beyond belief. The Nara found himself in the exceeding rare position of having to mentally catch up events, rather than being multiple steps ahead.

_I was trying to find out the problem, right? I kept asking and he...he kissed me and I..._ Shikamaru's head was swimming. _Did I actually just kiss him? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck..._

Neji broke the deadlock first, stepping backward and continuing down the stairs to the ground floor.

"I'll see you later, Nara," he offered in the closest thing the Hyūga had to a casual tone, leaving Shikamaru staring at nothing in the empty stairwell.

* * *

Four hours. He'd spent four hours sitting here? Fuck.

Shikamaru was hardly a stranger to spacing out in silence, but by the time he realised his cloud-watching had turned into stargazing it was nine o'clock and had already been dark for an hour.

He'd come out here straight after his last class, wanting to distract himself. The opposite had occurred. He'd thought of nothing but the... _moment_ he'd shared with his roommate hours ago now. Not strictly true, perhaps, he'd thought of said roommate generally too.

Shikamaru got up, knowing he had to leave soon or he'd risk being caught creeping back to his dorm after hours and detention and questioning were really two things he did not need right now. As he walked, he turned over the memory he'd been agonising once again in his mind. This time he found himself considering detail over reasoning, thinking of the feeling of the moment rather than the blind impulse that led to it: thinking of the Hyūga's closeness; thinking of the sensation of their lips, their tongues...thinking of the Hyūga: his pale eyes; his high cheeks and regal jaw; his pale skin; the amount Shikamaru wanted to see of it. Shit.

Shikamaru reached the third floor of the dormitory block without any issue other than his own thoughts. He steeled himself before reaching for their shared door, mentally slapping himself. He could act perfectly normally. He could banish everything he'd just been thinking.

He opened the door, walking in calmly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a note if you've the time.  
> -Pip


	3. Chapter 3

Three weeks. For two people who shared a twelve foot by twelve foot room they were damn good at avoiding the blatantly obvious tension. Of course, tension has a way of amassing.

A day before the end of the school term their so-called 'social circle' was in the ground floor common room, celebrating the coming two-and-a-half week winter break. The group was loud and obtrusive, with the voices of Naruto and Kiba in particular carrying all the way to Neji and Shikamaru's room above.

Shikamaru made his way up to the roof in search of quiet. He found Neji had already done the same. The Nara thought of turning and running back down the stairs but Neji had already seen him.

To Shikamaru's surprise there was a cigarette between the Hyūga's pale fingers.

"You know you're in deep shit if wherever you hide those gets found." Shikamaru offered in dull humour.

"I think you'd have more of an issue, given they were under your bed," Neji replied, tone utterly flat. "Most people probably would have bought the hiding them under the porn magazine ploy though."

The Hyūga punctuated the statement with a drag on the contraband cigarette.

"You're obviously not ' _most people'_ ," Shikamaru said dryly as he sat down besides his roommate.

They both chose to outwardly ignore all significance or implication, intended or not, in the phrase. Inwardly, the knots grew tighter and more strained.

"I didn't think you smoked," Shikamaru stated after a noticeable pause.

"I don't." Neji replied, calm and crisp, taking an almost deliberately marked inhale of the toxins of the cigarette. "You do."

That pulled again at the winding knots in both there chests.

"Speaking of which," Shikamaru held out an empty hand, "you want to offer me one of my cigarettes or not?"

Neji handed over the half empty packet. The Nara plucked out another cigarette, pocketing the packet into his blazer as he pulled out his lighter. Shikamaru took a long slow drag before breathing out a cloud of smoke into the brittle winter air.

"These will kill you one day, you know," Neji commented, tone still calm and oddly distant.

"And you're immune to death are you?" Shikamaru replied, gesturing to the cigarette in Neji's own hand.

The Hyūga turned the slim cylinder over contemplatively. A thin smirk appeared on his face as gave a brief and low laugh. Those coils and knots grew taut enough that Shikamaru would have sworn he could feel them pulling him down.

"This isn't killing me," Neji said with a voice as dry as sand. "You are."

The Hyūga placed the cigarette between his lips for a final inhale.

Watching the older male, Shikamaru finally felt one of his knots snap. He stubbed out his cigarette.

Just as Neji began to exhale smoke Shikamaru grabbed him by the shirt and all but slammed his mouth onto the Hyūga's. His hands found purchase on the older boy's shirt, gripping into the fabric below both the shoulders. Briefly but intensely Shikamaru rolled his tongue against Neji's, which remained as still and tense as its owner in his shock. Neji dropped the glowing cigarette butt from his hand as his fingers responded against his will.

As quickly as he'd initiated the kiss, Shikamaru ended it. In the silent and still moment afterwards they both exhaled smoke.

It took a few seconds for Shikamaru's brain to kick back into gear enough to notice his leg was quickly turning into a dead mass of pins and needles thanks to the poorly balanced crouch he'd hastily adopted. He shifted his weight, lowering himself closer to Neji in the process.

The Hyūga looked pained, his pale gaze intense.

"You really are killing me," Neji spoke lowly, close enough to Shikamaru's face he could feel the other's breath.

Neji moved first this time, hand on the back of the other's neck as he pressed their mouths together. Shikamaru responded, not knowing if he should be running in the opposite direction but honestly caring less and less about that as the contact continued.

"So tell me why," Neji breathed across the Nara's lips, "I can't stop."

Shikamaru responded by running his tongue over the Hyūga's once more, hands slipping up onto his shoulders for better purchase. Neji responded in kind and the pair's exchange quickly shifted into a jumble of breaths, tongues and lips.

"Why?" The Hyūga repeated on a spare breath, only a little of the inner frustration showing through in this state.

"Don't know." Shikamaru breathed. He lowered his knees to the concrete surface either side of Neji's thighs. "But..."

The older male brought his legs up at some inexplicable instinct as their tongues tangled again. Shikamaru's balance was thrown. He thrust one arm up to the wall behind, as much on reflex as the other's action. Neji's knees pressed into Shikamaru's back and pulled him in closer until their upper bodies were near entirely flush against each other. Heat radiated between them at every new point of contact.

"But don't- Fuck!" Shikamaru swore suddenly as one or the other of them's unintentional shifting created deviously pleasurable friction between the areas of their groins.

"...Don't stop." Shikamaru finished, hoarser and more pressed.

Acting swiftly enough that neither of them had time to agonise over how horribly poor of an idea it was the Nara repeated the action with a slide of his hips. Then he did it again. Again. Again. Again, until the other groaned against his mouth as they both moved in a jarred, erratic pulse against each other.

Oh Gods, they both knew this was ridiculous, dangerous, infinitely stupid. They knew it. It was screaming in both their heads. Neji's mind was writhing, sensation too overwhelming for him to process with anywhere close to his usual cool detachment. Shikamaru couldn't find any version of possible outcomes that seemed good; although his reasoning was slowed enough that he'd only semiconsciously analysed a minimal ten or so since he'd taken an unplanned opinion in sticking his tongue down his roommate's throat.

Neji was brought a small ways back down to earth as the clumsy motion of their heads had his skull flop backwards into the wall behind him with a crack. Shikamaru tried to shuffle backwards in response but his knees ached from the concrete and the edge of the roof space was too close behind for his liking.

Jerking to his feet, the Nara dragged Neji up after him by the arm. They both staggered a little at the rushing of blood and the lack of it in their brains.

Shikamaru quickly kissed the Hyūga again, already missing the contact.

"Downstairs," was all he offered in way of suggestion and Neji didn't question him in this.

* * *

A few moments of hurried steps down stairs and hallway and they stumbled into their room.

Shikamaru had yet to let go of Neji's arm. He kissed his roommate once again, bringing back their lost contact swiftly. Neji grabbed the Nara's nape with one hand and clutched at his back, bunching up the fabric of his blazer, with the other. The Hyūga's grip was just over the line of demanding, enough to push their pace up and have their hearts beginning to pound.

Their lips didn't part as Shikamaru took a similarly firm hold around Neji's waist. He pulled the other as close as was possible, feeling every point of his angular frame and being very much aware of the fact he undoubtably felt Shikamaru's erection pressed against his thigh.

The Nara, however, found himself much more interested in the other's hardened cock also undeniably felt between them at this proximity.

The layers of clothing between them too was bothering Shikamaru. He managed to pull back from their kisses to cast the blazer off his shoulders. His tie quickly followed, it having been only half on in the first place, and Neji took the chance to attack the younger male's jaw and neck, nipping almost-but-no-quite hard enough to leave marks.

Shikamaru focused on the task of unbuttoning the Hyūga's shirt, starting from the bottom to avoid dislodging him for the wonderful things his teeth and tongue were doing to the Nara's neck.

The action seemed to put ideas in Neji's head as he pulled away enough to hastily unfasten Shikamaru's own plain, stark cotton shirt. The older teen was able to cast the garment off Shikamaru's shoulders in the time it took the younger to undo the remaining buttons on Neji's. Shikamaru's shirt was left pooling around his elbows until he let his arms drop and it fell to the floor.

The Nara's upper body was more toned than his perpetually untucked and slightly crumpled shirts suggested in the way they hung off his frame. He wasn't bulky, but the lightly tanned surface of his skin was pulled taut across the muscle structure underneath. He had a few scattered scars and such: a welt about two or so centimetres long below his right collarbone Neji remembered was from the time in junior high Shikamaru had somehow angered Ino enough to slap him with long, fake nails that missed their mark and made one decent, deep and unintentional cut; a neat, faded, silver trail of the surgical incision that had been used to remove Shikamaru's appendix at age twelve; an odd, almost star shaped patch of raised scar tissue about level with his lowest left rib of which Neji didn't know the cause. He'd have asked, but other matter were more pressing right now. Like his erection against his black uniform trousers.

Neji grasped the only slightly shorter male at the hips and pushed him backwards. Shikamaru slipped somewhat gracelessly out of the other's grip and onto the bed behind him, which happened to be his own. Neji made to follow him, one knee up on the mattress about to lift his whole body up after it.

Shikamaru placed his foot against the Neji's exposed stomach and pushed him back. Internally, Neji went into a backtracking overdrive. He grasped for his misstep, cursing himself, cursing his intense reactions, cursing the inexperience he did not wish to acknowledge. Cursing. Cursing with his face as utterly calm as before, just barely showing a new layer in the intensity of his pale gaze to Shikamaru.

The mental bounds were reeled back in as few seconds as they'd been made. Shikamaru had pulled himself vaguely upright to sit at the edge of the bed, stretch out his legs and unfasten then tug down his trousers. He was slowed a little by having to kick off his shoes before he could get them off completely. He then dragged himself backwards to sit width-ways on the bed, back against the wall, legs out before him at slight angles, feet over the edge of the bed.

Neji looked down at the balled up trousers on the floor for a split second. He looked up at his roommate, who smirked a little, crookedly, leaned there in nothing but his boxers. Neji recognised the invitation as well as the seed of discomfort in the core of his brain.

Teenage hormones thankfully had the ability to snuff out hesitation. Thank the Gods for lust-fuelled autopilot. It quickly had the older teen pinning the other between the bed and the wall.

They kissed less with lips and much more with teeth and tongues. It was harsh, careless and distinctly demanding. It was becoming clear that the air of tension storing up within and felt from without them both had been even greater than first thought. It was also clear that tension was almost entirely sexual. From the other's reactions, Neji could guess that he hadn't been the only one fixated on his roommate.

Shikamaru wanted him almost as much as he did Shikamaru.

The Nara tried and failed to bite back a low groan at the way the angles of Neji's frame pressed against him. He hoped that most of their peers were still downstairs but the thought was cut short by their shared muffled gasps as their cocks met in an echo of their earlier inadvertent friction.

This time the sensation was magnified somewhat by Shikamaru's lack of trouser-ed confines. The Nara groaned again as Neji repeated the jarred movements of slim hips, doing his best to meet the sporadic tempo in the roll of his own muscles but failing entirely. The Hyūga seemed almost frantic; but not totally so, and not in the right way.

Shikamaru needed to make this work or the pressure in his gut and blood in his cock would drive him insane. Dealing with the uncomfortable catch of his roommate's trouser zipper against his more vulnerable disrobed self seemed a good place to start.

Shikamaru pulled at the back of Neji's open shirt, untucking the sections of it that had remained in place. He then quickly felt his way around to the Hyūga's fly, which he had unfastened in seconds. Shikamaru was about to begin the logistical nightmare of getting the black uniform trousers off Neji in this position when his hands were pulled away sharply.

The Nara expected to be harshly pinned down, flipped around, or otherwise physically manipulated into a submissive role. Of the few males he'd been with before, the majority were the sort who hated the idea of anyone but them being in control and Shikamaru half expected attempts at dominance. Neji was undeniably proud, after all; a Hyūga to his core. Shikamaru doubted he liked being dominated.

But the way Neji stared at Shikamaru, holding up his arms by the wrists, the way his breaths came fast and caught on his throat, said something else: the wrong kind of frantic.

Neji shoved Shikamaru back. He stood hastily from the bed, turning away and then standing there facing his own bed opposite, shirt hanging loose and trousers slipping a little down his hips. Shikamaru blinked, dumbfounded and painfully horny. The Nara held back the words of irritation about fall from his lips. He'd have angrily thrown them at Neji, complaining at this screwing him around, were it not for the hint of what he'd seen in the other's expression in the breath of stillness seconds before: the type of franticness. Shikamaru could have sworn Neji looked afraid. But fear wasn't something the Hyūga was capable of, not with his ego.

They were silent for a time. The room still, save their breathing- one, two, three, four...Slowing with every inhale from heavy pants to level pulse.

Shikamaru's analytical instincts kicked in as the racing in his blood slowed. He mentally turned over the evidence of Neji's behaviour: from the cigarettes, to the way he'd hastily pulled off Shikamaru's shirt before losing his own; from the blindly lustful and poorly tempo-ed nature of his movements, to that look the many distractions of the situation had allowed to seep past the cracks of his stoic veneer. Questions of inclination and experience came to mind, among others, but the so-called genius Nara knew at least enough about Neji's sense of personal pride not to ask right now. If at all.

Shikamaru paused for only a few more seconds to plan his actions, as far as they could be planned.

Neji didn't move when he heard Shikamaru's bare feet on the wooden floor. He didn't move when Shikamaru's hands planted lightly on both of his shoulders. He didn't move when those hands skimmed along his arms and came to rest on his hips. He didn't move.

He could have pushed away, left, never looked his roommate in the eye again. He could have relaxed, stayed, somehow encouraged Shikamaru.

He didn't.

The Nara's fingers glided along the partially exposed plane of Neji's abdomen before slipping carefully lower. A sharp intake of breath rattled through the Hyūga's dry throat as those fingers brushed against his erection through the fabric of his underwear.

Shikamaru removed his other hand from Neji's hip to wrap the arm around his narrow waist. The shorter Nara pressed closer in to the Hyūga's back, hoping Neji wouldn't push away.

He didn't.

When Shikamaru softly kissed the side of his neck Neji relaxed somewhat.

"It goes without saying..." The Nara murmured somewhere against his collarbone. "But I'll stop whenever you want."

The Hyūga didn't respond; it was really already a given. Shikamaru had just felt the need to stress it. It was hard to tell the difference between tenseness and discomfort with one so stoic, after all. The Nara silently hoped Neji was just as preoccupied with supremely fucking this up as he was.

Shikamaru buried his concerns into the spot between Neji's neck and shoulder over which he was running his tongue. He bit down lightly enough to not leave a mark and the Hyūga tensed before relaxing into the contact.

Neji made no attempts at protest as the Nara's hand slid into his underwear.

Shikamaru's grip was loose as he slowly stroked the length of Neji's cock. The Hyūga groaned and instinctively bucked his hips into the touch.

Well, Shikamaru was doing something right.

To his credit, the lazy Nara managed to maintain his focus on the other, on his breathing, on the catch in his throat, on the soft groans he sporadically emitted, on the strain in the muscles- of his pale neck, of his taut skin under Shikamaru's hand around his waist. Even as all these details and more ground against Shikamaru's resolve he resisted the urge to similarly grind his uncomfortably hard cock against Neji's back.

The older boy finished relatively quickly, already rapid breaths stuttering into gasps. His head fell back and it was all Shikamaru could do not to latch onto that pale neck, push the Neji on to a bed or against the wall and fuck him and those gorgeously slim hips until neither of them could see straight. The need to claim, to possess, was suddenly and disturbingly strong in that second of release, with Shikamaru's cock still hard beyond belief and only barely touching the back of Neji's thigh.

The Nara pushed the flash of dominant desire down swiftly. It wouldn't do good for either of them. Not with Neji warring with shadows Shikamaru could only just begin to understand.

Shikamaru began to back away. His mental calculation focused on the distances from his trousers and shirt on the floor, and the necessity of them given the direction towards the door and the few feet between him and the bathroom. His thoughts were undeniably on reaching the room down the hall and giving himself the relief he desperately wanted. Neji caught his arm without turning to face him.

"I was just going to, you know, _deal_ with myself now..." Shikamaru felt suddenly much more awkward.

"I know." Neji's tone was back to its level, emotionally neutral default.

He recovered quickly, it seemed. If anything the Hyūga was oddly, though not really uncharacteristically, distant. It sang of introspection.

"There's no reason to leave for that." Neji continued.

Shikamaru did realised a retreat now was unnecessary. It was fairly safe to assume that wanking off one's roommate without any complaints arising eroded some of the unwritten 'no masturbating while dorm-sharing' rules that kept the regular occupation of all four floors' relative bathrooms high. Still, his instinct was to flee to the privacy of a shower stall. Shikamaru himself wasn't ever much of a exhibitionist and Neji had that complex maze of social and physical boundaries that the Nara, as ever, did not have the dedication nor inclination to force through or map out.

Yet here they were, with Neji in relatively blunt terms telling Shikamaru he'd no objections to his roommate getting himself off in front of him. And with Shikamaru for some unfathomable reason finding he liked that thought.

It was so nonsensical the physical fact of it was surreal in of itself. Dreamlike. Distant.

Shikamaru was a dark cloud on the night breeze with silvery orbs of twin moons slipping in and out of blurry focus until he couldn't tell if he was seeing them or fantasising images involving them. He was vaguely aware of his legs giving out and his crumpling down to sit on his bed in terms of the rush of wind current shifts.

When he finally finished after what felt a small lifetime thanks to his earlier restraint, Shikamaru collapsed onto his back, sprawled diagonally across his mattress with his legs hanging off the bed frame.

Another tiny age and he summed up the energy to lever his head and shoulders up to see Neji sat on his own bed looking back at him. The Hyūga was calm and unreadable as ever, clothes righted so that the only sign visible on him that anything had happened at all was a untucked shirt.

Shikamaru had got as far as removing his hand from his boxers. Even that was only because he needed both arms to push his shoulders upwards to see across the room. He had no intention of moving despite his state of undress or the mess that had been made of his bed clothes.

The contrast was almost poetic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The longest chapter...it didn't go too badly I hope but excuse my editing errors, as ever.  
> This is the closest I've ever come to publishing, though certainly not writing, sexual content. Ever. There will undoubtably be much more, for these guys and in completely separate works.  
> Well, pop goes my soft porn authorship cherry...haha.  
> I quite enjoyed this attempt at writing our dear Neji as a little awkward...Or perhaps more just simply inexperienced, given its contrast to his usual demeanour. I hope it comes out well enough on wider reading...  
> And yes, there is slightly more to his reaction than meets the eye. Shikamaru might have got it, but he was...distracted.  
> Onwards to the conclusion of this first piece. Thanks for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

Neji was sitting up in his bed when Shikamaru rolled over in his own. The lamp above him cast the Hyūga in a yellow hued glow and he had a book open in his lap. The green backlit face of Shikamaru's unreliable watch read '4:32'.

"What you reading?" The Nara asked, groggy with sleep.

"Nothing anymore. I can't focus." Neji replied in a low voice, weary of the thin walls of the dormitory building.

Focus was meant to be something the Hyūga excelled at. Yet here, with the soft light behind his head picking out the edges of his image and dissipating to a dull haze, Neji looked isolated enough that one could begin to believe even his falter.

Other people might have asked the obvious 'what's wrong?' question. But Shikamaru was not the sort to push, given the effort it needed and the unpredictability of the results, and he also knew Neji well enough to be aware pushing was not something he would respond well to. Neji shared slowly and on his own terms if at all.

"I hate going back to the clan house." Shikamaru reeled mentally at the sliver of personal thought Neji offered stoically and not so much as looking at his roommate.

Shikamaru's wheels started clacking through the phrase. Wording, intention, effect, subtext, context, implication...everything churned through his interlocking gears: 'Clan' not 'family' because Hyūga was a name, breeding and heritage, a dynasty, an international powerhouse, a tradition, an obligation, not a family; 'house' not 'home' because the land and buildings that formed a veritable sprawl of an estate on the open and expensive outskirts South of Konoha city proper was status and display, money and position, not a home; and 'clan house' not 'my home' because of all these things and more.

There was more, Shikamaru was sure, but he didn't ask to be told it.

"I was given my father's rooms last year. There is an old tradition of treating the age of seventeen as an introduction to one's adult role before legally of age. I despise using them." Neji sounded reserved, careful; he was unused to explaining his feelings.

"Don't go back there if you hate it," Shikamaru offered when the length of silence seemed to suggest Neji was done talking through his thoughts.

The older male scoffed.

"Were it only so simple." He moved the book from his lap to the desk space behind the low headboard of the bed. "You, of all people, aren't enough of an idiot to think it can be that easy, surely."

"I don't get the whole reserved clan hierarchy thing all that much. I have a family. With me and parents who seem to want to kill each other half the time, it's pretty average actually. So, yeah...I _can be_ that easy." Shikamaru gave a sort of shrugging roll of his shoulders. "But I'm guessing it's not."

"I have responsibilities." The Hyūga said by way of response.

"You have free will." The Nara retorted.

Neji glared at him, the closest those silver eyes came to raw emotion on any regular basis.

"And I obviously have the free will to be an arsehole," Shikamaru sneered at himself flippantly and the glare was dropped for the most part along with the conversation.

* * *

Shikamaru placed a scrap of paper on the side of Neji's desk as he was clearing it the next morning. The Hyūga turned to give him a vaguely questioning look.

"If you decide you prefer free will and an arsehole to...whatever it is the Hyūga family cult get up to," Shikamaru offered in a tone as vague and wide as the look. "Well it's only about five stops on the underground and my parents don't really care about people dropping by. I think my mum likes that it gives her an excuse to drag me out of bed..."

Neji finished packing up his books and pocketed the slip of paper with the address of the Nara family home scrawled on it. Shikamaru assumed that was all his open invitation would get in interpretable response.

Instead, just as Neji went to leave, bag over his arm, one hand on the door and the other around a box of textbooks, he said simply:

"Thank you."

And that, Shikamaru found, was even more openly interpreted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And......part one closes. I hope you've enjoyed this story so far. I plan to work on the continuation into part two over the next few weeks and then start posting, but I'm notorious for my inability to hold to any kind of deadlines...you should ask my English Literature teacher. So keep your eyes open for it.  
> I battle over the ending for a while. Overall I like the tone.  
> I hope you'll sick around for more. I warn you, however, on top of my inability with deadlines I'm pretty sure from my drafts thus far this plot line may well get a lot darker and more angst-y in tone before the curtain closes. Just to give a heads up.  
> Other than that, many, many thanks for reading, reviewing, dropping notes etc. Love and gratitude.  
> -Pip


End file.
